I've attended LitQuake and LitCrawl in San Francisco for years now, and it's always a fun-filled smorgasborg literary experience.  You really never know what will happen.

When my friend Na'amen asked me to read for LitCrawl this year in a multicultural reading, I happily agreed.  I had previously met my co-reader Heather Eccles, who is cool has ( Read more... )

I met Leonard in the summer of 2009 in San Diego, when he attending the Clarion Writers' Workshop. At that time, I was visiting Shweta Narayan, and we had spent all our waking hours for almost 2 days baking and cooking an overabundance of food, which we foisted onto Leonard and his Clarion classmates.  It was our way of letting them know that they ( Read more... )

At Worldcon this year, there were four panels about science fiction in China, and I was fortunate to be on all four. Because there were actual science fiction writers and scholars from China present and because they were brilliant and all spoke fluent English, I wanted them to talk as much as possible. Thus, I decided take a role as cultural ( Read more... )

Worldcon (aka Chicon 7) starts in a few days, and I'm excited to be speaking on panels about science fiction & fantasy written for young adults as well as the speculative fiction of China and India. AND I'll be giving a reading!  To say I'm nervous is a vast understatement.  But, at the same time, it will be an experience!

My first-ever Worldcon ( Read more... )

I'm delighted to have a poem "Merciful Deity" published today in Stone Telling 8, entitled Together, Apart.  It is a poem about the power of naming entwined with identity, requiring two voices for the audio version. I am grateful that poet and writer Na'amen has lent his gorgeous voice to my poem.

Read and listen to my poem "Merciful Deity" in ( Read more... )

American astronaut Neil Armstrong just died today at the age of 82 years old. He the first person to walk on the moon. The famous quote "That's one small step for man, one giant step for mankind" was spoken by Mr. Armstrong as he took his first famous step on the moon on July 20, 1969.

When I was in grad school few years ago, I wrote a short ( Read more... )

A few years ago, when I decided to become serious about writing for young adults and children, I boldly registered for the enormous SCBWI LA international conference.  This was a bold move for me because I knew no one, and I am by nature quite shy.  It was a scary experience navigating my way through a sea of a thousand people without a single ( Read more... )

I'm finishing my Wiscon Blog, but this is seriously the Best Marriage Proposal EVER.  It begins "On Wed. May 23rd I told my girlfriend, Amy, to meet me at my parent's house. When she arrived I had stationed my brother to sit her on the back of a Honda CRV with some headphones on..."

High Quality Video Version

Lower Quality Video Version

It ( Read more... )

So I wasn't planning on this, but the deluge of publication news continues on my blog, which I guess is a good thing. Rose Lemberg has posted the Table of Contents for The Moment of Change, an anthology collecting previously-published speculative poetry. All I can say is WOW. I'm honored to see my poem "Self-Portrait" listed among excellent ( Read more... )

Strange Horizons is the oldest pro-paying online magazine completely devoted to the speculative. New fiction, poetry, and reviews are published every week and ranges from science fiction to fantasy to horror. What I admire about Strange Horizons is that they often publish the works of writers at the beginning of their careers, though the bar is ( Read more... )